Whitney Tilson's School Reform Blog

Tuesday, December 16, 2008

Democrats for Education Reform Statement on Selection of Arne Duncan to Head Department of Education

Here's DFER's press release on the Duncan appointment:

"In spite of decades of talk about education reform, the system remains broken," said Joe Williams, executive director of DFER. "The Obama administration, with Arne Duncan at the head of the Department of Education, will lead the charge of breaking the existing ideological and political gridlock to promote new, innovative and experimental ideas in education."

DFER believes Duncan represents the very best choice for the Secretary of Education with his long history of commitment to improving public education in the United States. As CEO of Chicago Public Schools since 2001, Duncan has demonstrated that he understands that improving educational opportunities for children is a critical investment in our nation's future. Under Duncan's leadership, Chicago has been at the forefront of school restructuring and improving teacher quality. During his seven year tenure Chicago Public Schools have demonstrated sustained improvements in student achievement, graduation rates and college-going rates.

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Democrats for Education Reform Statement on Selection of Arne Duncan to Head Department of Education

DFER recommended Duncan to the Obama administration in their Education Transition Memo as a way to send a strong signal that education reform will be a priority for the administration

In response to the widely reported selection of Arne Duncan to head the U.S. Department of Education in President-elect Obama's administration, Democrats for Education Reform (DFER) championed the selection and urged the incoming secretary to make good on the promises Obama made while campaigning for the presidency. DFER was an early advocate of the selection of Duncan in the Education Transition Memo they released on November 11, because of his commitment to education reform ideas and his experience implementing reform in the Chicago Public Schools.

"In spite of decades of talk about education reform, the system remains broken," said Joe Williams, executive director of DFER. "The Obama administration, with Arne Duncan at the head of the Department of Education, will lead the charge of breaking the existing ideological and political gridlock to promote new, innovative and experimental ideas in education."

DFER believes Duncan represents the very best choice for the Secretary of Education with his long history of commitment to improving public education in the United States. As CEO of Chicago Public Schools since 2001, Duncan has demonstrated that he understands that improving educational opportunities for children is a critical investment in our nation's future. Under Duncan's leadership, Chicago has been at the forefront of school restructuring and improving teacher quality. During his seven year tenure Chicago Public Schools have demonstrated sustained improvements in student achievement, graduation rates and college-going rates.

"During the long fight for the presidency Barack Obama made clear that education will be a central focus of his administration," Williams continued. "In his speech in Grant Park in Chicago on election night President-elect Obama listed education in his top five priorities for his term in office. He has promised to increase funding for charter schools, create a system for rewarding excellent teachers, and expand pre-K -- all issues that DFER has campaigned rigorously in favor of."

DFER supports Democratic candidates committed to progressive ideas like greater mayoral accountability for schools; adjustments in teacher licensing requirements; changes to teacher compensation to reward our best educators; and a renewed focus on early childhood education (in particular, linking early childhood education with charter schools, which usually do not include Pre-K).

About Democrats for Education Reform (DFER)

Democrats for Education Reform (DFER) is a political action committee whose mission is to encourage a more productive dialogue within the Democratic Party on the need to fundamentally reform American public education. DFER was founded in June of 2007 by a group of Democratic contributors and education reformers who were frustrated that the Democratic Party appeared to be unfairly resistant to positive change in schools. http://www.dfer.org/

Joe Williams, executive director of Democrats for Education Reform, said last week that his group would be delighted to see Mr. Klein or Ms. Rhee appointed, but had sent to the transition team a memorandum recommending Mr. Duncan.

“He is the kind of guy who can work with all sorts of people with different viewpoints, and we like his work in Chicago with charter schools,” Mr. Williams said.

Duncan is embraced by the teachers unions, who have been concerned about high-stakes testing and worry about merit pay being tied to test scores, as well as reformers, who favor charter schools and tougher standards.

Duncan partnered with the Chicago Teachers Union to develop a performance-pay plan for the city's teachers, while also supporting charter schools. Democrats for Education Reform wrote in a policy paper that Duncan "has credibility with various factions in the education policy debate and would allow President Obama to avoid publicly choosing sides in that debate."

"Duncan is someone we believe can work with everyone, and that's going to be an important part of setting a new tone to get things done in the new administration, instead of treading water," said Joe Williams, executive director the New York-based Democrats for Education Reform.

Joe Williams, executive director of Democrats for Education Reform, a political action committee that advocated for Mr. Duncan to be selected as Education secretary, said he had been a proponent of charter schools, or public schools operated by outside organizations, as well as merit pay for teachers -- both controversial topics among teachers' unions.

Duncan, head of the Chicago school system since 2001, is generally well-regarded in the education community, and he has won praise for an emphasis on teacher quality and focus on graduation rates. Duncan favors keeping, but significantly revising, President Bush's 2001 No Child Left Behind law (PL 107-110).

He won praise from Democrats for Education Reform, a New York-based political action committee, which endorsed Duncan for the post.

"Duncan has credibility with various factions in the education policy debate and would allow President Obama to avoid publicly choosing sides in that debate in his most high-profile education nomination," the memo read.

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Chicago Schools Chief Is Obama’s Education Pick

Arne Duncan, the Chicago schools superintendent known for taking tough steps to improve schools while maintaining respectful relations with teachers and their unions, is President-elect Barack Obama’s choice as secretary of education, Democratic officials said Monday.

Nobody Better Than Arne Duncan

Arne Duncan is expected to be announced as the next secretary of education later today. Freakonomics readers will remember Arne as the hero of our chapter on teacher cheating. He was head of the Chicago Public Schools when Brian Jacob and I were investigating how teachers and administrators were doctoring standardized test sheets.

With seemingly nothing to gain and much to lose, Arne embraced our results, even allowing us to do audit testing to confirm our hypotheses. Eventually, a handful of teachers were fired.

Since then, I’ve interacted with Arne a few times, and in a variety of settings. I always walk away dazzled. He is smart as hell and his commitment to the kids is remarkable. If you wanted to start from scratch and build a public servant, Arne would be the end product.

About five years ago, I joked with him that he was not even 40 years old and he had the second-best job in education. He had nowhere to go but down, since the only better job would be secretary of education.

For all his accomplishments improving schools, perhaps even more remarkable are his accomplishments on the basketball court: he and his buddies have won the national Hoop It Up Three-On-Three basketball championship on multiple occasions.

Some excellent news for education reform -- President-Elect Obama will tomorrow morning name Arne Duncan his pick for US Secretary of Education. During his time in Chicago's public school system, Duncan has been a strong advocate for meaningful reform.

Duncan is midway through implementing his mayor-backed Renaissance 2010 plan to create 100 new schools (many of them charters); he describes himself as a "portfolio manager" of both district- and charter-operated public schools. Low-performing schools have been closed and reopened with new staff and revamped curriculum. As he explains, "We've been able to do things - for example, close schools for academic failure. It is hugely difficult, it's hugely controversial and it's absolutely the right thing to do. That simply does not happen in other cities, because of a lack of political will." In a hearing this summer before Congress, he testified, "We are one of the few districts in the country that literally shut down underperforming schools and replaced the entire school staff." The turnaround strategy has resulted in doubled or tripled student performance in many of these schools, he testified: "Same children, same families, same socio-economic challenges, same neighborhood, same school building... Different teachers, new leadership and a new educational approach, and the results are dramatic. As Chancellor Klein said, it puts the lie to any myths of what poor children can or cannot do."

Duncan espouses accountability and data-driven decision making (indeed, the announcement tomorrow will be at Dodge Renaissance Academy, where they publish their recent math and reading scores with pride on their home page). He opposes social promotion, which he describes as a "shameless practice."

He shuns the "blame the parent / blame the kid" mentality, testifying in a July 2008 hearing: "I worked in the inner-city community for some time and saw that parents, despite whatever lack of education they had, they were extraordinarily interested in their children's education and in wanting something better. So before we blame parents I think we need to really be self-critical and look in the mirror first."

Duncan is a forceful advocate for charter schools; in May his office issued a press release touting a RAND/Mathematica study showing 8th graders in Chicago charters were more likely to graduate high school and to attend college than traditional district-run schools. In the release, Duncan said: "We're very pleased to hear how well our charter school students are prepared for their future, but we aren't surprised by these results. We work hard to make sure all of our schools are among the many high-quality educational options for parents looking for the right fit for their children." The report also found that Chicago charters do not "skim the cream." The sub-headline of the release from his office: "Charter schools are one of many high-quality, diverse educational options, says Duncan."

Duncan favors a merit-based pay system to reward excellent teachers for performance and has begun to roll out such a program in Chicago with the support of union leadership. Like DC, only teachers who want the system get it -- in Chicago, a school that wants to adopt pay-for-performance must get 75% of the teachers to vote for it. He says, "In our world, talent matters tremendously, and nothing is more important than geting the best and brightest adults working with our children every single day." He hired 171 new principals this fall. He has attracted many new teachers, getting 10 resumes for every available slot, improving the quality of the applicant pool.

He embraces Obama's call for an "army of new teachers." In Chicago, he secured TFA's newest regional training site, and hired 330 TFA corps members this fall alone (these are in addition to the 250 TFA alumni still teaching in Chicago and the 25 TFA alumni currently working as principals in the city). In welcoming the newest corps members this fall, he said, "We are thrilled that Teach For America serves as a channel for this idealism, as well as a pipeline that brings outstanding teachers and leaders into the district."

He supports No Child Left Behind, calling its focus on accountability "a huge step in the right direction," and supports a move that tracks growth or "value-added" in a given school year rather than a one-time snapshot (i.e. Stanford 10 in September and June to measure the growth in achievement, rather than a one-time snapshot).

When I spoke with Duncan several weeks ago on the phone to get his advice and counsel on our search for a new commissioner, he seemed genuinely excited about our position and he spent a half hour giving me specific feedback on who our committee should consider recruiting for the post. I'm glad Rhode Island is on his radar and I will definitely call him back after the dust settles in the 2009 to ask for his help and perhaps including Rhode Island on his tour of states that are advancing the cause of education reform in his first year in office.

60 Minutes

Our slide presentation on the mortgage crisis – the causes, current situation and what the future holds – is posted at www.valueinvestingcongress.com (on the right side under "T2 Partners"). In addition, 11 video clips of me presenting these slides is at: www.ValueInvestingTV.com.

Reform ideas, including choice, merit pay, curbing teacher tenure, and promoting alternative certification, are gaining mainstream acceptance in the Democratic Party largely thanks to the efforts of Democrats for Education Reform. An important indication of this political shift was an event at the Democratic National Convention organized by the Democrats for Education Reform at which an audience of about 500 cheered speakers denouncing the teacher unions and embracing reform ideas. The Democratic supporters of reform largely (but not exclusively) consist of urban minority leaders, including Michelle Rhee, Joel Klein, Adrian Fenty, Cory Booker, Kevin Chavous, Al Sharpton, and Marion Bary. Go ahead and make all the Sharpton and Bary jokes you like, but this (mostly) minority defection of urban Democrats from union orthodoxy is like a political earthquake that will have important implications for future reform politics. And it’s true that some conservatives have begun backtracking on reform ideas, including Sol Stern, Diane Ravitch, and depending on the day of the week, Checker Finn and Mike Petrilli. But if the reform movement has traded some conservatives for the new generation of minority Democratic leadership, I think we’ve come out ahead.

Greene has a sad but true conclusion about the "the 5 most important developments during 2008 that hindered reform of K-12 education":

And finally the most disappointing development of 2008 is that we spent another half trillion dollars on public education without significantly altering the dysfunctional system that fails to teach a quarter of 8th grade students to read at a basic level or get them to graduate from high school. Results for minority students are significantly worse. The economic bailout may be a $700 billion enterprise, but the public school system spends almost that much each and every year. Every year that we spend that money without fundamentally altering how we operate public education is another fortune wasted and another year lost for millions of students.

It’s getting to be that time when people make lists of good and bad things that happened during the preceding year. Here’s mine from an interview with Michael F. Shaughnessy of EducationNews.org:

What were the 5 most important developments during 2008 that contributed to reform of K-12 education?

1) Barack Obama strongly endorsed the idea that expanding choice and competition is an important part of improving public schools. He limited his support to expanding choice and competition through the introduction of more charter schools, but the theory is not fundamentally different than doing the same with vouchers. Whether Obama follows through on this campaign position or not, it is now clear that it is considered politically desirable among both Democrats and Republicans to support choice and competition. Holdouts from this view, including the teacher unions on the left and curriculum-focused reformers on the right, are being increasingly marginalized.

2) Sarah Palin, in her only major policy speech, pushed the idea of special education vouchers. Like Obama embracing choice and competition, Palin embracing special ed vouchers is a symbol of the political attractiveness of the policy. Special ed voucher programs already exist in Florida, Georgia, Ohio, Utah, and Arizona (pending the resolution of a court case). I’d expect the idea to spread to several more states in the next four years regardless of Sarah Palin’s political prospects.

3) Reform ideas, including choice, merit pay, curbing teacher tenure, and promoting alternative certification, are gaining mainstream acceptance in the Democratic Party largely thanks to the efforts of Democrats for Education Reform. An important indication of this political shift was an event at the Democratic National Convention organized by the Democrats for Education Reform at which an audience of about 500 cheered speakers denouncing the teacher unions and embracing reform ideas. The Democratic supporters of reform largely (but not exclusively) consist of urban minority leaders, including Michelle Rhee, Joel Klein, Adrian Fenty, Cory Booker, Kevin Chavous, Al Sharpton, and Marion Bary. Go ahead and make all the Sharpton and Bary jokes you like, but this (mostly) minority defection of urban Democrats from union orthodoxy is like a political earthquake that will have important implications for future reform politics. And it’s true that some conservatives have begun backtracking on reform ideas, including Sol Stern, Diane Ravitch, and depending on the day of the week, Checker Finn and Mike Petrilli. But if the reform movement has traded some conservatives for the new generation of minority Democratic leadership, I think we’ve come out ahead.

4) We saw a string of new or expanded school choice programs in 2008. Georgia adopted a universal tax-credit supported voucher program. Louisiana adopted a voucher program for New Orleans as well as a personal tax deduction for private school tuition. Florida expanded and decreased burdensome regulation on its tax-credit supported voucher program. And Utah increased and secured a source of funding for its special ed voucher program. For a movement declared dead more times than Generalissimo Francisco Franco, school choice continues to grow.

5) I’ll take the privilege of the final development to brag about the launch of the new doctoral program in education policy in the Department of Education Reform at the University of Arkansas. It may not have been among the 5 most important developments in the whole country, but it was a big development in my little world. With the first cohort of students starting in the Fall of 2009 (supported by a pool of generous fellowships) and a collection of outstanding faculty, we have the potential to significantly increase the number of reform-oriented researchers in academia, think-tanks, and foundations.

What were the 5 most important developments during 2008 that hindered reform of K-12 education?

1) The reform movement lost two great champions this year with the passing of John Brandl and J. Patrick Rooney. Brandl, who had been the Democratic leader of Minnesota’s state senate and Dean of the University of Minnesota’s Hubert Humphrey School of Public Policy, contributed significantly to the argument that choice was not only efficient, but also enhanced opportunities for the disadvantaged. He helped create the state’s pioneering charter school law and other choice programs. Brandl also served as mentor to many of today’s leading choice researchers. Rooney, who had always been active in the civil rights movement, personally sponsored scholarships for disadvantaged students to attend private schools. His privately financed program became a model for publicly funded voucher and tax-credit supported scholarship programs.

4) A Florida court struck down the ability of a state commission to approve charter schools. If upheld by the (notorious) Florida Supreme Court, only school districts could approve charters and existing charters approved by the state commission may have to be closed. Giving districts the exclusive power to grant charters essentially allows the districts to decide with whom they will have to compete. It’s like giving McDonalds the exclusive power to approve the opening of all new restaurants. The state Supreme Court used the same narrow interpretation of clauses in the state constitution to strike down the Opportunity Scholarship voucher program, so the prospects for a vibrant and competitive charter sector in Florida are not good.

5) And finally the most disappointing development of 2008 is that we spent another half trillion dollars on public education without significantly altering the dysfunctional system that fails to teach a quarter of 8th grade students to read at a basic level or get them to graduate from high school. Results for minority students are significantly worse. The economic bailout may be a $700 billion enterprise, but the public school system spends almost that much each and every year. Every year that we spend that money without fundamentally altering how we operate public education is another fortune wasted and another year lost for millions of students.

Obama Picks Arne Duncan for Education Post

The rumor I heard was right: NPR, the Chicago Tribune and the NY Times blog (see below) are all reporting that Obama has picked Arne Duncan to be Secretary of Education (plus there's a press conference tomorrow).

This is AMAZING news and genuine school reformers should be celebrating!!! I predict that Duncan, with Obama's support, is going to be transformational and make a huge difference in the lives of millions of American children.

My main concern at this point is who Obama picks as Duncan's #2. Here is what I sent out about this 10 days ago:

Deputy Secretary of Education

The Deputy Secretary of Education is a powerful and important position, so in addition to picking a strong Secretary, Obama also needs to choose an equally strong, reform-oriented #2.From what I hear, while Linda Darling-Hammond has no chance of being Secretary, but there might be a natural inclination by the Obama team to throw her (and the unions) a bone by making her Deputy Secretary, which would be a disaster.Do NOT underestimate her: she’s influential, clever and (while she does her best to hide it) an enemy of genuine reform, so she could totally undermine whomever is Secretary.Let’s be realistic – she’s likely get some position in the DOE, but it must not be the powerful #2 position. (For more on LDH, see the article below and my thoughts on her at: http://edreform.blogspot.com/2007/12/obamas-disappointing-choice-of-linda.html)

Instead of LDH, there are many other superstars who would be great #2’s such as the following four people (listed in alphabetical order; full bios are at the end of this email):

nMichael Lomax, the President and CEO of the United Negro College Fund.He’s been a teacher, elected official and university president, and serves on the national boards of KIPP and Teach for America, among others.

nTed Mitchell, the CEO of the NewSchools Venture Fund.He was formerly the President of Occidental College (coincidentally, where Obama attended before transferring to Columbia).

nAndrew Rotherham, the co-founder and co-director of Education Sector, an independent national education policy think tank. He is a member of the Virginia Board of Education, launched the Progressive Policy Institute's 21st Century Schools Project, and served at The White House as Special Assistant to the President for Domestic Policy during the Clinton administration, where he managed education policy activities at the White House and advised President Clinton on a wide range of education issues.

nJon Schnur, the founder and Chief Executive Officer of New Leaders for New Schools, who is currently on a leave of absence to advise Obama on education issues.He was a policy advisor on K-12 education in president Bill Clinton's administration for seven years, serving as White House Associate Director for Educational Policy, Vice President Gore's Senior Policy Advisor on education, and Special Assistant to U.S. Secretary of Education Richard Riley.

Obviously only one of these guys can get the #2 position, but all of them should be offered other senior positions in the DOE, as it’s critical that genuine reformers are in key staff positions throughout the DOE.

In addition to being happy for my country and its children, I'm personally breathing a sigh of relief because I stuck my neck out in saying very publicly (see my blog post, below) years ago that Obama:

A) Understood the crisis in American K-12 public education and, deep in his core, was committed to addressing it;

B) Knew that the old union-driven nostrums of spending more money to hire more teachers to reduce class size wouldn't work;

C) Embraced most of the new approches that DO work: high standards and expectations, accountability, differential pay for teachers, removing ineffective teachers, fostering the growth of high-quality charter schools, etc.; and

D) Was willing to spend political capital and take political risks on this issue.

We haven't answered all of these questions definitively -- C) and D) will take time to see -- but Duncan's appointment (and other things Obama has said and done) I think put to rest many of the worries in the education reform community -- believe me, I heard them! -- about whether Obama was one of us.

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December 15, 2008, 5:30 pm

Obama Picks Arne Duncan for Education Post

President-elect Barack Obama will name Arne Duncan, the superintendent of schools in Chicago, to be his Secretary of Education, a senior Democratic official and a second person close to the decision said.

He has seven years’ experience as chief executive of the Chicago Public Schools, the nation’s third-largest school district, where he has earned a solid reputation for confronting pressing issues in public education, like how to raise teacher quality, how to transform weak schools and when to shutter those that are irredeemably failing.

Word of the selection comes as Mr. Obama’s transition team said Monday that he would make an important announcement on Tuesday morning at the Dodge Renaissance Academy, an elementary school that Mr. Duncan and Mr. Obama visited together in October 2005.

Obama recently gave a speech (posted here) in which he compellingly laid out the crisis in our public schools and, critically, was the most specific and the most bold he's been to date about what he would do about it as President.He really pushed the reform agenda and, in doing so, courageously took on the most powerful interest group in the Democratic Party, the teachers unions.Click here to read my blog post about this.

“It seemed like a natural issue for us.Segregation wasn’t much of an issue anymore; whites had all but abandoned the system.Neither was overcrowding, at least in black neighborhood high schools; only half the incoming students bothered to stick around for graduation.Otherwise, Chicago’s public schools remained in a state of perpetual crisis – annual budget shortfalls in the hundreds of millions; shortages of textbooks and toilet paper; a teachers’ union that went out on strike at least once every two years; a bloated bureaucracy and an indifferent state legislature. The more I learned about the system, the most convinced I became that school reform was the only possible solution for the plight of the young men I saw on the street; that without stable families, with no prospects for blue-collar work that could support a family of their own, education was their last best hope.And so in April, in between working on other issues, I developed an action plan for the organization and started peddling it to my leadership.

“The response was underwhelming.

“Some of it was a problem of self-interest, constituencies misaligned.Older church members told me they had already raised their children; younger parents, like Angela and Mary, sent their children to Catholic schools.The biggest source of resistance was rarely talked about, though – namely, the uncomfortable fact that every one of our churches was filled with teachers, principals, and district superintendents.Few of these educators sent their own children to public schools; they knew too much for that.But they would defend the status quo with the same skill and vigor as their white counterparts of two decades before.There wasn’t enough money to do the job right, they told me (which was certainly true).Efforts at reform – decentralization, say, or cutbacks in the bureaucracy – were part of a white effort to wrest back control (not so true).As for the students, well, they were impossible.Lazy.Unruly.Slow.Not the children’s fault, maybe, but certainly not the schools’.There may not be any back kids, Barack, but there sure are a lot of bad parents.

“In my mind, these conversations came to serve as a symbol of the unspoken settlement we had made since the 1960s, a settlement that allowed half of our children to advance even as the other half fell further behind.More than that, the conversations made me angry; and so despite lukewarm support from our board, Johnnie and I decided to go ahead and visit some of the area schools, hoping to drum up a constituency beyond the young parents of Altgeld.”

Uncertainty on Obama Education Plans

I’m quoted in an article in today’s NY Times about whom Obama might pick as the next Secretary of Education:

One former Teach for America official who has been outspoken is Whitney Tilson, a New York mutual fund manager.

In a recent blog entry, Mr. Tilson said of Dr. Darling-Hammond, “She’s influential, clever and (while she does her best to hide it) an enemy of genuine reform.”

Mr. Tilson is on the board of Democrats for Education Reform, a political action committee based in New York.

The group sent the Obama transition team a 43-page memorandum shortly after the election with policy advice and a “wish list” of candidates for secretary that included Mr. Duncan; Wendy Kopp, founder of Teach for America; and Jon Schnur, who started a nonprofit group, New Leaders for New Schools, that trains principals for urban schools, said Joe Williams, the executive director of Democrats for Education Reform.

Mr. Williams said his group also liked Mr. Klein and Ms. Rhee. “We’d be thrilled,” he said, “if either one were named secretary.”

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December 14, 2008

Uncertainty on Obama Education Plans

As President-elect Barack Obama prepares to announce his choice for education secretary, there is mystery not only about the person he will choose, but also about the approach to overhauling the nation’s schools that his selection will reflect.

Despite an 18-month campaign for president and many debates, there remains uncertainty about what Mr. Obama believes is the best way to improve education.

Will he side with those who want to abolish teacher tenure and otherwise curb the power of teachers’ unions? Or with those who want to rewrite the main federal law on elementary and secondary education, the No Child Left Behind Act, and who say the best strategy is to help teachers become more qualified?

This Huffington Post article by John Affeldt defends LDH and claims that I and others opposing her selection for the #1 or #2 position at the DOE are engaged in "a well-choreographed crusade", "old school divisive politics", "in-fighting and the backstabbing", etc.

Darling-Hammond has spent 30 years pushing for a radical restructuring of public schools and the systems that serve them so that all students will have high-quality teachers and rich learning opportunities, not just well-off, predominantly white kids. To call her a defender of the status quo is like calling Lincoln a defender of slavery because he wasn't as absolute in opposition as were some on his team of rivals. The provocative rhetoric would also miss the fact that Lincoln, at the end of the day, alone possessed the unifying wisdom and skills to steer the nation to its most radical of reforms.

The partisans may be congratulating themselves on a well-choreographed crusade, but one has to wonder: what campaign were they watching win the Presidency? From the kick-off in Springfield, Barack Obama styled himself not just a little on Lincoln: rising above old school divisive politics; exchanging thoughts in respectful debate; taking the best ideas and humbly but boldly moving forward, building consensus along the way. By drawing so heavily from the old playbook, the hard-chargers may have just charged off the cliff--virtually ensuring Obama will be less receptive to their pleas.

Beyond the discordant tactics, much of the substance of their agenda similarly misapprehends the Obama style and vision.

Affeldt's article is well articulated -- but is nonsense. He is confusing bitter, personal attacks with spirited arguments about who would provide the best leadership and has the best ideas to reform a system we all agree is broken so that every child in America gets at least a solid education. This isn't personal -- I don't doubt for a moment that LDH cares deeply about kids and wants to do what's best for them. And I don't even think her ideas are bad -- it's that they're so LIMITED! She fails to appreciate that it's THE SYSTEM that's the problem and needs to be reformed and also fails to even acknowledge that there are WAY too many ineffective teachers who simply need to find other careers -- and that no amount of better training can change this. She also doesn't understand that the power of Teach for America (and a handful of similar programs) is not just the direct outcomes (students learn more in TFA teachers' classrooms), but also that TFA is a remarkable recruiter of talent into a sector sorely lacking it. It's NOT a coincidence that KIPP and nearly every important education reform organization was founded by or disproportionately staffed by TFA alums. I could go on, but you get the idea...

In summary, if all of the reforms she proposes were adopted, I don't think it would move the needle much to chance educational outcomes -- but everyone would feel good about the pseudo-reforms and real reform would be derailed. THAT'S why she and her ideas are so dangerous!

A slickly-coordinated string of editorials and columns in the New York Times, the Washington Post, The New Republic, the Chicago Tribune, the Los Angeles Times and elsewhere has poured forth recently, all decrying the possible appointment of Stanford University Professor Linda Darling-Hammond as Secretary of Education. Obviously responding to the same talking points, the pieces paint Darling-Hammond a status quo, incrementalist and anoint a new group of pro-merit pay/pro-testing/pro-charter school advocates as the hard-charging "reformers."

Friday, December 05, 2008

My thoughts on Secretary and Deputy Secretary of Education; A Job for a Reformer; Who Will He Choose?; How dangerous is Linda Darling-Hammond, Obama's old-school, pro-union education guru?

Dear fellow school reformers,

I know I send out so many emails that nobody can possibly keep up with all of them, but if you read one email from me this year, make it this one.

I'm writing to share my thoughts on whom I hope President-elect Obama will pick to be Secretary of Education and, almost as importantly, whom he picks (and doesn't pick!) to be the Deputy Secretary, as well as three articles from the Washington Post, the New York Times and The New Republic that I think capture an extremely exciting and historic shift that's occuring.

If you agree with me and are in a position to call someone on the Obama team, please do so THIS WEEKEND, as I suspect the decisions regarding the Secretary and Deputy Secretary of Education will be made within a matter of days.

Obama's choice of Secretary of Education will be the single most important decision he will make in this arena, and I feel strongly that he should choose either Joel Klein or Arne Duncan.Both would be great, but I personally favor Klein because the work of education reform is so hard and I've witnessed up close his willingness to fight the really hard battles.Since I've never met Duncan and follow the reforms he's initiated inChicago less closely, I cannot have the same confidence in him as I'd have in someone whom I've come to know as well as Klein.I should note that in this preference I am speaking only for myself; other education reformers whom I respect and work closely with think very highly of Duncan and are optimistic that he would forcefully advocate for a reform agenda.

The real questions that I'd want to ask about any potential Secretary of Education candidate include:

1) Is he/she a true reformer  a "disrupter" rather than an "incrementalist", to quote Rep. George Miller?;

2) Does he/she have the skills, experience and connections to maximize the chances of actually bringing about meaningful change?; and

3) Does he/she have the strength, courage, passion and willingness to run through walls and suffer endless slings and arrows to always do what's right for kids?

I can say with 100% certainty that the answer to each of these questions for Klein is an emphatic YES.Based on what I've read and heard about Duncan, the answers are likely yes as well  but not quite to the same degree, with the same amount of certainty.When it comes to helping millions of children who today are suffering in failing schools, I want certainty!

So why do I think Obama is more likely to pick Duncan than Klein?In part because they're both from Chicago and I understand that Duncan has very strong, long-standing relationships with both Barack and Michelle (and, as an added bonus, Rahm Emanuel). Given that the new administration will be focused primarily on the economy, Iraq, health care, etc., the importance of these relationships shouldn't be underestimated.Thus, for the same reason I favor Klein in part because I know him much better, Obama might favor Duncan.

But, sadly, there's another important factor as well: politics.If Obama picked Klein, the teacher union bosses will weep, gnash their teeth and get their knickers in a twist because Klein has been so strong in always pushing for what's best for kids, regardless of whether that threatens the interests of adults (who are, of course, accustomed to having their way).Obama's team would certainly prefer not to get the nation's largest and most powerful interest group riled up in the early days of the new administration, so for this reason I think he's likely to pick a less controversial reformer.

If Obama does, in fact, choose Duncan, reformers should still be celebrating because he's likely be a very good Secretary of Education  but I still hold out hope that he'll pick Klein.If I had five minutes on the phone with him, here would be my argument:

1) You should pick the person who is most likely to bring about the greatest reform in the shortest time  PERIOD!

2) Among possible candidates, Duncan and Klein stand out.Klein has the experience, relationships and track record, both in NYC and Washington, that are unrivaled by any other candidate.He's run the largest school system in the country  2% of all U.S. public school students are in NYC  for the past 6½ years and has transformed it  so much so that the city won the coveted Broad Prize last year.He has deep experience in Washington, was the CEO of Bertelsmann and, most importantly, no-one cares more  and is willing to fight harder for  always doing what is best for kids.

3) Sure the unions stamp their feet, but so what?You owe them nothing.In fact, they did everything they could to squash your candidacy during the primaries.

4) Finally, it would send a powerful message that you're truly a New Democrat, focused on doing what is best for the country, even if it means angering entrenched interests in your own party.

Deputy Secretary of Education

The Deputy Secretary of Education is a powerful and important position, so in addition to picking a strong Secretary, Obama also needs to choose an equally strong, reform-oriented #2.From what I hear, while Linda Darling-Hammond has no chance of being Secretary, but there might be a natural inclination by the Obama team to throw her (and the unions) a bone by making her Deputy Secretary, which would be a disaster.Do NOT underestimate her: she's influential, clever and (while she does her best to hide it) an enemy of genuine reform, so she could totally undermine whomever is Secretary.Let's be realistic  she's likely get some position in the DOE, but it must not be the powerful #2 position. (For more on LDH, see the article below and my thoughts on her at: http://edreform.blogspot.com/2007/12/obamas-disappointing-choice-of-linda.html)

Instead of LDH, there are many other superstars who would be great #2's such as the following four people (listed in alphabetical order; full bios are at the end of this email):

nMichael Lomax, the President and CEO of the United Negro College Fund.He's been a teacher, elected official and university president, and serves on the national boards of KIPP and Teach for America, among others.

nTed Mitchell, the CEO of the NewSchools Venture Fund.He was formerly the President of Occidental College (coincidentally, where Obama attended before transferring to Columbia).

nAndrew Rotherham, the co-founder and co-director of Education Sector, an independent national education policy think tank. He is a member of the Virginia Board of Education, launched the Progressive Policy Institute's 21st Century Schools Project, and served at The White House as Special Assistant to the President for Domestic Policy during the Clinton administration, where he managed education policy activities at the White House and advised President Clinton on a wide range of education issues.

nJon Schnur, the founder and Chief Executive Officer of New Leaders for New Schools, who is currently on a leave of absence to advise Obama on education issues.He was a policy advisor on K-12 education in president Bill Clinton's administration for seven years, serving as White House Associate Director for Educational Policy, Vice President Gore's Senior Policy Advisor on education, and Special Assistant to U.S. Secretary of Education Richard Riley.

Obviously only one of these guys can get the #2 position, but all of them should be offered other senior positions in the DOE, as it's critical that genuine reformers are in key staff positions throughout the DOE.

Thank you for making a call this weekend, if you're able, and let's cross our fingers!

Sincerely yours,

Whitney

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Here are three AWESOME articles that came out today. It's truly historic when liberal-leaning publications like these three are calling on a Democratic President to break with the most powerful interest group in the Democratic Party -- the Washington Post editorial even refers to "the forces of the status quo"!

1) The Washington Post's editorial:

We trust that Mr. Obama was serious when he promised change and will select someone who -- instead of just tinkering with a tired, low-performing system -- will be bold in choosing new directions for American education...

...Nor should opposition from the forces of the status quo scare Mr. Obama away from considering someone such as New York City Schools Chancellor Joel I. Klein, who has helped improve the nation's largest school system.

We are not promoting any individual, but the ideal candidate would be someone who is not afraid to break with orthodoxy, who is more concerned with results than with ideology, who has a proven ability to lead large systems toward change and is passionate about regaining America's place as the best-educated country on the planet. It's encouraging that, in his nominations to date, Mr. Obama has been sure-footed and inspiringly unpredictable. He won't be able, nor should he try, to placate all the education interests, so he should focus on the only interests that matter -- those of America's schoolchildren.

2) An Op Ed in the NY Times by David Brooks:

But the union lobbying efforts are relentless and in the past week prospects for a reforming education secretary are thought to have dimmed. The candidates before Obama apparently include: Joel Klein, the highly successful New York chancellor who has, nonetheless, been blackballed by the unions; Arne Duncan, the reforming Chicago head who is less controversial; Darling-Hammond herself; and some former governor to be named later, with Darling-Hammond as the deputy secretary.

In some sense, the final option would be the biggest setback for reform. Education is one of those areas where implementation and the details are more important than grand pronouncements. If the deputies and assistants in the secretary's office are not true reformers, nothing will get done.

The stakes are huge. For the first time in decades, there is real momentum for reform. It's not only Rhee and Klein  the celebrities  but also superintendents in cities across America who are getting better teachers into the classrooms and producing measurable results. There is an unprecedented political coalition building, among liberals as well as conservatives, for radical reform.

No Child Left Behind is about to be reauthorized. Everyone has reservations about that law, but it is the glaring spotlight that reveals and pierces the complacency at mediocre schools. If accountability standards are watered down, as the establishment wants, then real reform will fade.

This will be a tough call for Obama, because it will mean offending people, but he can either galvanize the cause of reform or demoralize it. It'll be one of the biggest choices of his presidency.

Many of the reformist hopes now hang on Obama's friend, Arne Duncan. In Chicago, he's a successful reformer who has produced impressive results in a huge and historically troubled system. He has the political skills necessary to build a coalition on behalf of No Child Left Behind reauthorization. Because he is close to both Obamas, he will ensure that education doesn't fall, as it usually does, into the ranks of the second-tier issues.

If Obama picks a reformer like Duncan, Klein or one of the others, he will be picking a fight with the status quo. But there's never been a better time to have that fight than right now.

3) An article in The New Republic:

In November, Barack Obama bewildered education reformers by tapping Linda Darling-Hammond, a Stanford professor who had advised his campaign, to oversee the transition's education policy team. Their verdict was swift and harsh. "Worst case scenario," wrote Mike Petrilli, vice president for national programs and policy at the Thomas B. Fordham Institute, an education think tank, the day after The Wall Street Journal leaked the news. "This is a sign that the president-elect isn't a bona fide reformer," he later told me. Kate Walsh, president of the National Council on Teacher Quality, confirmed, "The reform community is scared to death."

The "reform community" is an aggressive group of education advocates who argue that the certification programs which produce teachers, and the unions that represent them once they're in the classroom, have had too tight a grip on progressive priorities in the field for too long. Instead, they want to shake up the system through programs that bring in new blood and hold teachers accountable. They place their hopes in nervy, pioneering leaders like Michelle Rhee and Joel Klein, the chancellors of the D.C. and New York City public schools, respectively. In Darling-Hammond--an academic, union favorite, and vocal critic of Teach for America and No Child Left Behind--they see the opposite: an ideological enemy representative of a sluggish status quo.

Reformers are right to be nervous. During the campaign, Obama deftly appeased all sides of the policy debate. While appealing to the unions, which have long been bastions of Democratic support, he also gave great hope to reformers inside and outside the party by supporting merit pay and pledging to increase funding for charter schools. In asking Darling-Hammond to helm the transition--a precursor, some worry, to her appointment as secretary of education--Obama has suggested that he wasn't entirely serious about change, at least when it comes to education. It's a misstep that threatens to derail his quest for post-partisanship--and ruin a critical opportunity to revolutionize America's lagging schools...

...That may be, but, with Darling-Hammond as the point person on deciding how to implement the most important pieces of an undoubtedly evolving platform, it's easy to imagine reform-backed proposals falling by the wayside. That's why, even if she does not secure a position in the Obama administration, the symbolism and influence she has in this preliminary stage are troubling. Vexing education's boldest change agents won't help Obama substantiate his still-murky education reform credentials and forge bipartisan policies. And, if Obama does elevate her to his Cabinet, the appointment would leave lasting wounds, both among reformers and in the nation's schools. "Hopes would be dashed . . . if [the secretary of education] isn't reformed-minded," Williams says.

In The Audacity of Hope, Obama wrote that "ideological battles [in education] . . . are as outdated as they are predictable." Too bad he's just started another one.

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A Job for a ReformerWill Barack Obama opt for boldness or the status quo in choosing an education secretary?

WITH MUCH of his national security and economic teams in place, President-elect Barack Obama faces another critical pick: education secretary. No names have emerged from the transition team, but warring camps within the Democratic Party are furiously seeking to influence the decision. We trust that Mr. Obama was serious when he promised change and will select someone who -- instead of just tinkering with a tired, low-performing system -- will be bold in choosing new directions for American education.

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December 5, 2008

Op-Ed Columnist

Who Will He Choose?

As in many other areas, the biggest education debates are happening within the Democratic Party. On the one hand, there are the reformers like Joel Klein and Michelle Rhee, who support merit pay for good teachers, charter schools and tough accountability standards. On the other hand, there are the teachers' unions and the members of the Ed School establishment, who emphasize greater funding, smaller class sizes and superficial reforms.

During the presidential race, Barack Obama straddled the two camps. One campaign adviser, John Schnur, represented the reform view in the internal discussions. Another, Linda Darling-Hammond, was more likely to represent the establishment view. Their disagreements were collegial (this is Obamaland after all), but substantive.

In November, Barack Obama bewildered education reformers by tapping Linda Darling-Hammond, a Stanford professor who had advised his campaign, to oversee the transition's education policy team. Their verdict was swift and harsh. "Worst case scenario," wrote Mike Petrilli, vice president for national programs and policy at the Thomas B. Fordham Institute, an education think tank, the day after The Wall Street Journal leaked the news. "This is a sign that the president-elect isn't a bona fide reformer," he later told me. Kate Walsh, president of the National Council on Teacher Quality, confirmed, "The reform community is scared to death."

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Bio of Michael Lomax

As president and chief executive officer of the United Negro College Fund (UNCF), Dr. Michael L. Lomax heads the nation's largest and most successful minority higher education assistance organization. Through its headquarters in Fairfax, Virginia, and 24 field offices across the country, UNCF annually provides operating and program funds to its 39 member private historically black colleges and universities (HBCUs) and their 60,000 students. In addition, it manages more than 400 scholarship programs that support nearly 10,000 students at over 900 of the nation's colleges and universities. In the course of its 62-year history, UNCF has raised and distributed over $2.5 billion and has assisted over 300,000 students in earning undergraduate degrees. In 1999, UNCF received over $1 billion, the largest private gift to American higher education, from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation to administer the Gates Millennium Scholars Program, which provides outstanding minority students with an opportunity to complete their undergraduate and graduate college educations.

Dr. Lomax joined UNCF after serving in a series of high-level academic and political positions. Immediately before joining UNCF, he served seven years as president of DillardUniversity in New Orleans.

Dr. Lomax went to Dillard after thirty years in Atlanta, where he pursued simultaneous full-time careers as a university professor and public servant. He graduated Phi Beta Kappa from Atlanta's MorehouseCollege (the alma mater of Dr. Martin Luther King) and, after receiving his M.A. degree from ColumbiaUniversity and his Ph.D. in American and African American literature from EmoryUniversity, taught literature at Morehouse and SpelmanColleges and the University of Georgia.

At the same time, he became a prominent figure in Atlanta government and politics. He began his public service as an assistant to Maynard Jackson, Atlanta's first African American mayor, and went on to serve as the first head of Atlanta's Bureau of Cultural Affairs. In 1978, he was elected to the Fulton County Board of Commissioners. Two years later, he became the Board's chairman, the first African American ever to hold that position and served in that position for twelve years.

Dr. Lomax is a trustee of Emory University, a member of the founding Council of the Smithsonian Institution's National Museum of African American History and Culture, and a member of the Boards of Directors of Teach for America, The KIPP Foundation, The Carter Center, the High Museum of Art in Atlanta, the Studio Museum in Harlem, The Bill T. Jones Dance Company and the National Black Arts Festival, of which he was founding chair. President George W. Bush appointed him to the President's Board of Advisors on Historically Black Colleges and Universities. He has also received numerous awards including The Laurel Crowned Circle Award from Omicron Delta Kappa (2006), the distinguished Emory Medal, the Candle in the Dark award from MorehouseCollege and several honorary degrees.

Dr. Lomax and his wife, Cheryl Ferguson Lomax, have two daughters, Michele and Rachel. His oldest daughter, Deignan, graduated from DillardUniversity in 2000.

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Bio of Ted Mitchell

Ted Mitchell assumed the role of CEO of NewSchools Venture Fund in the fall of 2005, after having served on the NewSchools Board of Directors for seven years.

Prior to joining NewSchools, Mitchell served as the 12th president of OccidentalCollege in Los Angeles. Mitchell's tenure at Occidental was marked by a dramatic improvement in both the College's national reputation and its engagement in the community, as well as by unprecedented financial growth. A former deputy to the president at StanfordUniversity and vice chancellor at University of California, Los Angeles, Mitchell is a national leader in the effort to provide high-quality education for all students and has long been active in California and Los Angeles educational reform initiatives. He currently chairs the Governor's Committee on Educational Excellence, charged with making recommendations to improve California's system of K-12 finance and governance, and is President of the California State Board of Education. He also serves on the boards of a variety of nonprofit education organizations.

Ted graduated from Stanford with bachelor's degrees in economics and history, and also earned a master's degree in history and a doctorate in education there.

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Bio of Andrew Rotherham

Andrew Rotherham is co-founder and co-director of Education Sector, an independent national education policy think tank. Rotherham, who Washingtonian Magazine describes as being "at the forefront of U.S. education policy," is also a member of the Virginia Board of Education. In addition, Rotherham writes a monthly column for U.S. News & World Report as well as the widely read and award winning blog Eduwonk.com, which an Education Week study found to be among the most influential sources of information in American education today.

In 1998, Rotherham launched the Progressive Policy Institute's 21st Century Schools Project, which he directed until 2005. Under his leadership, the project became a leading Washington D.C.-based education policy center. It developed public policy strategies to eliminate systemic inequities in American education and to redesign American public education into a system based on universal access to high-quality instruction, public sector choice and customization, common academic standards, and accountability for results. The project's ideas have been implemented in national and state education policy. Washington Post columnist David Broder cited one of the project's major policy proposals as "the clearest evidence of change" in the national education policy debate.

Rotherham previously served at The White House as Special Assistant to the President for Domestic Policy during the Clinton administration. He managed education policy activities at the White House and advised President Clinton on a wide range of education issues including the reauthorization of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act, charter schools and public school choice, and increasing accountability in federal policy. Rotherham also led the White House Domestic Policy Council education team, the youngest person to have done so.

Governor Mark Warner appointed Rotherham to the nine-member Virginia Board of Education in 2005. He was the youngest appointee in the modern era. In addition, Rotherham is currently a member of the board of directors of the Indianapolis Mind Trust and Democrats for Education Reform. He is also a trustee of the César Chavez Public Charter High School for Public Policy in Washington, D.C., and serves on advisory boards and committees for numerous organizations and institutions including The Broad Foundation, Harvard University, the National Governors Association, the National Charter School Research Project, the National Association of Charter School Authorizers, and the Campaign for a U.S. Public Service Academy. Rotherham is also a member of the Aspen Institute-New Schools Entrepreneurial Leaders for Public Education 2008 Fellows class.

Rotherham has published more than 100 articles, book chapters, papers, and op-eds about education policy and politics. Doublethink calls him "the go-to guy for those looking for serious, cogent, analysis of the latest education trends" and American School Board Journal says Rotherham is "one of Washington's leading commentators on education policy." He is a regular commentator on National Public Radio, and has written for a wide-range of publications including The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Wall Street Journal, The Los Angeles Times, USA Today, Education Week, The Washington Monthly, and The Times of London as well as academic and trade publications. In addition, Rotherham has authored or edited four influential books on education policy.

Rotherham, recently recognized as one of the "40 People Under 40 to Watch" by Washingtonian Magazine, was born and raised in Virginia and educated in Virginia's public schools and universities. A graduate of Virginia Tech he holds a master's degree from the University of Virginia and is completing a doctorate in political science from the University of Virginia. Rotherham lives in Earlysville, Virginia, with his wife, Julie who worked in international aid and public education prior to taking a professional break to focus on their two young daughters.

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Bio of Jon Schnur

Jon Schnur is the founder and Chief Executive Officer of New Leaders for New Schools - a national non-profit organization devoted to improving education for every child by attracting and preparing the next generation of outstanding principals for our nation's urban public schools. Schnur was a policy advisor on K-12 education in president Bill Clinton's administration for seven years, serving as White House Associate Director for Educational Policy, Vice President Gore's Senior Policy Advisor on education, and Special Assistant to U.S. Secretary of Education Richard Riley.

He spearheaded the development of many educational policies in such areas as teacher recruitment and training, after-school programs, school reform and charter schools.

Schnur spent several months at Harvard designing the business plan for New Leaders for New Schools while taking coursework at the Graduate School of Education, the BusinessSchool and John F. Kennedy School of Government. He graduated from PrincetonUniversity cum laude in 1989 and from a public high school near Milwaukee, WI, in 1984.